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The Necrotechs Workshop XXIX – Preparation

This Saturday, I’ll be going to play in my first tournament in four months. The fantastic John Spencer has picked this one up for me so I can play, and I intend to make the most of it. My real hope is that we have enough players for 4 rounds, though getting there will be tricky: The East Coast is experiencing a but of burnout from New England to Virginia.

That said, Lets take a look at what I’m thinking of bringing. I know it can’t possibly bite me in the ass, right?

I expect that exactly 0 people going to the tournament are going to read this, so I’ll just spill the beans on what I’ve got, my lists, and what I can reasonably think to drop them into. If you’ve a better pairing (based on the lists I’ve played, all4 of them) or spot a flaw, feel free to let me know!

First and foremost – Lists

Witch Coven of Gharlghast

-Egregore
-Deathripper

-Ripjaw

-Kraken

-Withershadow Combine

Orin Midwinter, Rogue Inquisitor

Satyxis Raiders x10

-Satyxis Sea Witch

Satyxis Raiders x10

-Satyxis Sea Witch

Lich Lord Terminus

-Inflictor

-Inflictor

Bane Thralls x10

Bane Thralls x10

Carrion Thralls x10

Carrion Thralls x10

Mechanithralls x6

Necrosurgeon and Stitch Thralls

Steelhead Halberdiers x10

Boogeymen

First, I’d like to take a look at what I expect to be there, and to have to plan for. Not in an individual player sense, but in both the common and larger meta feeling. What my locals are playing makes a big difference in what I expect to see at any given tournament, but the flipside to that is that we are all pretty standard when it comes to playing the game. I expect my Circle local to be playing Una2 and Wormwood. I expect my Cygnar Buddy to be playing Caine2/Haley2, or Kara Sloan/Haley 2. I’m pretty sure there are two local Khador players both sporting post-errata versions of Karchev because they don’t want to temporarily buy Mad Dogs. I’d expect the protectorate guy to be running High Reclaimer because he’s always loved High Reclaimer.

See what I mean?

That means I have to, very likely, prepare for these matchups:

Abby2/Lylyth3

Rhan/Hylenna/Ossyan

Una2/Wormwood

Caine2/Haley2/Sloan

Karchev/Irusk2

Madrak2/Ragnar

Ossrum/Magnus2

Rask/Calaban

Reclaimer/Sevy2

Father Lucant/Aurora

Coven/Denny1

Skorne

That should pretty much cover it. I’m much less confident than I was in MK II that I won’t get Gotcha’d, but I think if I’ve got an answer for most of the above, I should have a decent shot of making every game an actual game and not just get steamrolled by a beefcake.

Matchups

Coven

The Coven, being the caster I am most familiar with at this point in the edition, is likely to be my go to caster for the majority of the tournament. With the one change I made to their standard list, punting the Soulhunters out and replacing them with Satyxis Raiders, allows me to play better into a few of the stranger lists, most notably Ossrum and Karchev. Doing a significant amount of damage with the feedback from raiders will allow the Kraken and the deathrippers to get into position to try and chip away for the assassination. They will also be able to slide through just a ton of infantry given the chance. Curse of Shadows and Veil of Mists will both allow me to position for the best possible feedback charges on the best targets.

The Coven also does well against both close and midranged lists, creating plays where both are on the backfoot from the Feat and from the Satyxis long threat range. I will miss the extreme threat of the soulhunters, but I think the feeback in a meta with more warjacks is worth the loss. Melee lists will either be alpha’d, or will suffer their alpha strike at -2 MAT and RAT. Midranged lists are in a really bad position as the Satyxis simply create to many high defense problems and the Kraken is to big of a threat on its own for most of them to handle.

Terminus

This guy is the big question mark. He’s a MKII list in a third edition world and I don’t know that he’s going to make it. There are a few things he does have going for him when it comes to matchups, though. The first is that he is as skewey a list as you can make with infantry. I’ve oft assumed that I won’t need too much infantry have because the lists will only contain a unit or two. This list pushes that number much, much higher. Any list that relies on a few big damage dealers might find its way blocked simply because there isn’t a hole to punch through this list without needing to kill at least a half dozen models. Furthermore, Terminus doesn’t care that his own lanes are blocked, because flight allows him to just scoot right up the field. I really want a killbox list with this guy, because being able to flee is his worst nightmare. His troopers aren’t particularly stout, though he assists a bit with granting tough. I feel confident in the list for the most part, but I dread having it come across something with a lot of area denial or an extreme volume of attacks.

All of that said, he does a number on two of the boogeymen in the game, and gives me a fair shot against another one or two. First, he tells certain Kara Sloan lists exactly where to shove it. He can personally absorb 5 shots a round before he takes any losses to his army. He can pawn off almost every shot of pow 12 or less simply due to his armor and his focus while diverting big shots to his mechanithralls, and important shots off to his Inflictors. Grevious wounds, Disruption, and other attack types are simply not going to affect him because he’ll target that shot wherever he pleases. Even the inflictors will save each other, if needed, pulling shadowfire or other shots to the wrong target.

The second bogeyman he wants to see is Madrak 2, strangely enough. Even though Madrak can kill almost the whole of the army, when he does, Terminus will be standing right there to take him down, and Madrak just can’t take out Terminus by his lonesome. Even at POW 15 weaponmaster, he does 3 damage an attack, for 5 attacks. It is a lot, but I’m pretty sure I can survive it. It is also unlikely that he will be able to chew through one or more of the inflictors, leaving me a whole pile of attacks to take him out, if he does try it. Finally, even though I have the steelheads in the list, they won’t pose a problem. they’ll go first on turn one and hack each other down, giving corpses to the Necrosurgeon, who will build more Mechanithralls, who will kill three more of the Steelheads on their turn, leaving only two on the board turn 2, and none after that, so I’m pretty sure that I can make it pretty punishing for Madrak to try and solo the army, so the game will turn into a standard Trollblood-Cryx matchup.

Finally, I think he’s got some play, as much as the Coven, into Wormwood. They have Ghost Walk and Veil of Mists, he has Flight, Ghostly, and more flight. He’s also got two big fat bases to hid behind to make sure that he doesn’t get smacked by Stranglehold at inopportune times. Thankfully Wormwood also brings a significant count of souls in the list, so Terminus gets a solid feat and the army has enough models to absorb Wormwoods feat and subsequent alpha strike. Additionally, its likely that I’ll have some of my Bane Thralls left alive to take down any heavies that he’s got lurking in the background.

Plans

Looking at the faction matchups, I think this is about where I stand:

Abby2/Lylyth3 – Terminus

Rhan/Hylenna/Ossyan – Coven

Una2/Wormwood – Terminus

Caine2/Haley2/Sloan -Terminus

Karchev/Irusk2 – Coven

Madrak2/Ragnar – Terminus

Ossrum/Magnus2 – Coven

Rask/Calaban – Coven

Reclaimer/Sevy2 – Coven

Father Lucant/Aurora – Coven

Coven/Denny1 – Terminus

Skorne – Coven

I actually end up with more Terminus than I originally thought. While coven can take out a lot of options, there are a few that I really want the big guy to take care of.